We had another day to explore Page, Arizona, and one of the things left on Denisa's list of activities was walking the bridge over the Glen Canyon Dam. Just a few feet shorter than Hoover Dam, it's still one of the biggest in the country. We went to the visitor's center to watch the national park film, and found they had three different films. We have found these national park documentary films are very educational. They are also a cool and comfortable place for a nap on a hot afternoon (ask us how we know that). In the picture above, we can see Lake Powell peeking over that very tall dam.
In the picture below, we see the view from the other side of the bridge. That would be the Colorado River, meandering its way towards the Grand Canyon. The electrical lines that are seen angling up the ridge to the electrical towers will provide the power to over two million homes this year. That energy is produced from the hydro-electric generators in the dam.
We also took a drive to another part of Lake Powell. This is the Wahweap boat ramp area, with another view of those big house boats, now anchored in front of and even bigger Castle Rock.
We looked for the best hike in the area, and found few to pick from. We opted for the Hanging Garden trail that leads to an alcove under a sandstone hill close to the lake. Water seeps through the porous sandstone, watering the wall of ferns under the ceiling.
Instead of posing under the ridge, of course Mark climbed on top of the ridge.
Denisa would follow him anywhere, so of course she followed him over the ridge, where we could get a view of Lake Powell in the distance.
Under some of those rock overhangs we found an exceptional modern art painting. Actually, it was a kaleidoscope of different colored lichens. We could see orange, yellow, green, gray, black, and white all within a camera frame.
The swirling sandstone forms ridges and curves that are fun to see. Even though it would be a nice level walk along a pebble-lined trail back to the car, Mark had other ideas. He found a "short cut" that only took us twice as long to get back to the parking lot. This was because we had to back-track several times to find a less steep way off that hill.
But as always, he finally found a way down, and Denisa snapped a picture of Mark's latest hill to summit.
The next morning we left Page, Arizona, heading south and east to our next destination. Because we had taken the interstate route on another trip, this day we drove through the Navajo and Hopi reservations on a very lonely highway. We realized after several hours that we hadn't seen a gas station or a grocery store since we left Page. What we did see were miles of fences, but no cattle. Of course, we didn't see any grass behind those fences for the cattle to eat. After many miles, we finally arrived at a new state, but we could barely read "New Mexico" through all the bug splatters on the windshield.
We pulled into a familiar campground to spend the night at Gallup, New Mexico. We love going to new places, but it was nice to come back to Red Rock Park, with its view of Church Rock on top of the red cliffs that surround the campground.
Gallup was a good place to wash clothes, and ready for the next four nights of camping with no hookups. We are now jammed into a huge parking lot along with over 6,000 other RVs that will attend the Balloon Fiesta here in Albuquerque. In the picture below you can see the black front of our motor home, hemmed in with the other vehicles and RVs. Our slide-outs are almost touching our next door neighbor, but we are all glad to be here. There should be pictures soon of some hot air balloons!
Lake Powell is one of the biggest lakes in the United States, so it naturally is home to some of the biggest boats. It's hard to tell in this picture taken from a long distance, but these boats are a lot bigger than our motorhome. They are 4-6 bedroom houseboats, and people live on them for weeks at a time, exploring the nooks and crannies of this 186 mile-long lake. With over 2,000 miles of shore-line along Lake Powell, that is more than the entire west coast of the United States.
Extra big boats would explain this extra long and wide boat ramp. You can barely see Denisa in her bright red blouse, standing beside the pier at the end of the boat ramp on the right. This ramp is around a quarter of a mile long, so it's quite a hike to walk to where our car was parked in the lot at the top of the hill.
We're here not to launch a huge houseboat, but our tiny sea eagle kayak. We are pumped up and ready to float on the mighty Lake Powell.
We weren't alone on the lake. Even on a week day well after Labor Day, there were plenty of people out enjoying the lake. Lake Powell was formed when Glen Canyon Dam was completed in 1966. Since then, the Colorado River has flooded the canyon to form the lake. That makes for a very interesting lake with tall canyon walls and huge underwater drop-offs that used to be deep canyons. This tour boat was taking a load of tourists down the same path we were kayaking.
The tourist boat had a strong engine to help it plow against the water to its destination. Denisa's boat had a similar size engine in the back of her boat.
We rowed in the main lake channel until we got to the antelope canyon cut-off. The same name as the underground canyon we were in when we took all those crazy swirling pictures, we are just a few miles north.
We had beautiful blue skies today, but for some reason, we looked up and saw a rainbow stretching over the canyon walls. Just a reminder that we are are wandering God's wonders!
Besides motor boats and tour boats, we also saw some stand up paddlers going up antelope canyon. There's two paddlers in the picture, and you can barely see the one in the bottom middle that is closer to the canyon wall. His height helps to give scale to those amazing cliffs we were paddling between.
We had been paddling for over 3 miles, and we were nearing the end of antelope canyon. The canyon walls were getting closer together, and the water was turning browner. It would finally turn into something that looked and smelled like a peat bog. It was obviously time to head back to the beautiful blue water downstream.
Just like with hiking, Denisa some times gets bored with returning the same way and seeing the same things. So she entertained herself by taking pictures. This one was taken looking down towards the water, picturing the reflection of the wavy-topped canyon walls and the wispy clouds overhead. She also got the white side of the boat and her rounded black oar tip in the picture. Mark is thinking she probably should be using that oar to help get us back to the car.
She also tried to take a picture of the canyon wall and the blue skies, with the reflection of both in the lake water. The good news about those tall cliffs is that we could paddle in their shade on this hot summer-like afternoon. Since Denisa isn't paddling, we got lapped by the couple in the yellow rental kayak in the picture.
There was also time to take the selfie picture of the two of us in the kayak today. Denisa's Mother should note that we both have our life jackets on. That's probably a good idea because Lake Powell is over 500 feet deep in places, and averages 132 feet deep. Like many of the lakes we have seen in this area, it is lower than they would like. The lake is actually 93 feet below full pool right now, but that is twenty feet higher than it was two years ago.
The wildlife picture of the day has to be one of the 100 lizards we saw running along the vertical canyon walls. They have obviously taken on the red sandstone color, so they really show up well against the white canyon walls.
We are on the home stretch towards the car, and realized that we hadn't taken a close-up of the beautifully clear water. From a distance, it is a tantalizing azure blue. Kayaking in the shallow edges, it looks green. Or a more poetic color analysis came from Mark when he described it as "Mountain Dew pop bottle green."
Denisa is so lucky to get to share this adventure with such a poetic guy!
The main reason we came to Page, Arizona, was to see Antelope Canyon. Years ago Denisa had seen pictures taken here, and it has been on her bucket list ever since. So be warned, there will be way too many pictures in the blog today!
Antelope Canyon is an underground canyon that was carved by water and wind to form
sweeping curves and tunnels out of the red sandstone. There's just enough light coming into the
tunnels to give the sandstone different colors and shadows.
It was an expensive outing by our standards, but it was a beautiful place to be! On Navajo land, we had to first pay an entrance fee, and then a ticket for a guided tour.
Then we headed into the canyon with 15 other people (right behind a
group of 15, with another group of 15 right behind us). It's obviously a
very popular place. So it was sometimes hard to get a picture without other people in it.
The first part of our tour included climbing down several sets of ladders into the underground canyon. These metal ladders are new since 1999. Before that there were ropes and wooden ladders to navigate the canyon. The better ladders were installed after 12 tourists died in a flash flood while on a tour in this canyon in 1997.
It was great fun walking through the curving tunnels. We never knew what we would see around the next curve. Mark took a picture of Denisa taking pictures, because there weren't many times that she wasn't.
Mark was using his camera phone, while Denisa was armed with our old Cannon camera. Our tour guide made suggestions for settings that would provide the best pictures in the low light of the canyon. We think the camera in the phone did a better job in the canyon, but Denisa still got some pictures of Mark.
Occasionally there were openings in the canyon to the sky, but most of the time we hiked with a ceiling overhead. Those windows of light, however, provided just the right shadows and highlights to turn the red sandstone into shades that ranged from yellow to purple.
Among our group of 15 people were two young women that were a joy to watch just because they were having so much fun. Neither spoke much English, but we knew they were from Asia.
They were right in front of us, and they would sometimes grab one of our cameras, point to where we should pose, and then start taking pictures of us with our camera.
After we left the canyon, we had a short conversation with them. We didn't have many words that we all understood, but we were delighted to find they were from South Korea. We'll be flying to Korea next month, and we hope we'll meet more citizens there as friendly as these two. When we told them we would be visiting their country, they immediately hugged us. We already feel welcome!
Here's another picture of our Korean friends, busy taking pictures. If we took 400 pictures in the canyon, they took 800.
Our tour through the canyon took close to an hour and a half. It was cool inside, which was a nice change from the temperatures in the 90's the desert outside is enjoying.
Most of the time the ceilings were quite high. But there were a few places where we had to duck to avoid low walls. Mark obviously had to do more ducking than Denisa.
Our tour guide found that trying to keep 15 people together and moving through this canyon was like herding cats. Actually, we were worse than cats because everyone had a camera, concentrating on getting the perfect picture. With swirling walkways, his group was out of eye sight every time a person rounded another curve. He did try to point out a few rock formations that resembled things like the shark from "Finding Nemo,"
or a woman with flowing hair.
He also tried to pose us in picturesque places in the canyon, and snap pictures with our cameras.
When visiting Page, there are actually two different canyons to explore. The most well-known is the Upper Canyon, and there are tour buses that leave from town to transport visitors there.
Before we got to Page, we talked to two different hikers that went to both Upper and Lower Antelope canyons. Both of them agreed that the lower canyon was a better experience. They told us that it was longer, less crowded, and it was cheaper as well.
The main disadvantages to the lower canyon was that it required climbing up and down ladders several times, and the floor was less level. It was also more narrow, and a longer walk to get all the way through. None of those things were inconveniences for experienced hikers like us, and we were glad we chose the lower canyon. Most of all, we were glad that we had another opportunity to experience another of God's wonders!
After a month and a half in Utah, we headed further south and drove into Arizona. Actually, the highway does an S-curve thing that took us down into Arizona . . .
and then snaked us back north into Utah as we headed east.
But we finally landed in our next campground at Page-Lake Powell Campground, in Page, Arizona. This is home to the Glen Canyon Dam that manages the water coming down the Colorado River.
The dam forms Lake Powell, which we will also visit while we are here. But this evening we headed to Horse Shoe Bend. We read that it was a good spot for sunset, and it looks like everyone else read the same thing. We couldn't believe the number of people there. The large parking area was almost full, and cars were also lining the highway! We were surprised that this many people would make the 3/4 mile hike to see this bend in the Colorado River.
When we got near the overlook, it was even more congested. You can see the line of hard-core photographers set up on the ledge on the left. They had tripods set up and were shoulder-to-shoulder vying for a spot at the best angle.
Mark managed to scoot on to that rounded edge beside them to snap the following picture. It is beautiful to see the 270-degree curve of the Colorado River far below. The water enters from the right, downstream from the dam, and exits around the bend to the left.
Denisa isn't usually squeamish about heights, but seeing Mark on the edge of that 1,000 foot drop-off made her almost queasy. She couldn't enjoy the view herself until Mark backed away from that edge. There are no barricades or safety railings at this viewpoint.
We moved to the far side of the canyon, where there were fewer people. Even though we couldn't see the entire curve of the river from here, it was a much more serene place to watch the sunset.
We climbed up on the highest hilltop near the edge, and had the view all to ourselves--much different from the crowds to our left. When Mark went back down to the edge, Denisa could take a picture of him all by himself below.
It's a beautiful start to our days here in Page, and tomorrow we have a very special outing planned.
We had another day to explore Page, Arizona, and one of the things left on Denisa's list of activities was walking the bridge over the Glen Canyon Dam. Just a few feet shorter than Hoover Dam, it's still one of the biggest in the country. We went to the visitor's center to watch the national park film, and found they had three different films. We have found these national park documentary films are very educational. They are also a cool and comfortable place for a nap on a hot afternoon (ask us how we know that). In the picture above, we can see Lake Powell peeking over that very tall dam. 
